FOLLOWERS OF CHANNEL 5’s Great Model Railway Challenge will know that the programme is filmed at the Fawley Hill Museum near Henley. The private museum, which is open on selected days to invited guests, includes a 120-foot long, finescale O Gauge layout which is installed along the balcony that overlooks the GMRC competition area.
The layout is an end-to-end, with a single track based on a planned, but never built, connection between Watlington and Wallingford stations. The models of these stations are based on information contained in two books: Great Western Branch Line Termini by Paul Karau and The Wallingford Branch by Paul Karau and Chris Turner.
https://wildswanbooks.co.uk/

Richard Cleaver Photos by the author unless indicated

Although the layout was constructed well over a decade ago, for a number of reasons the Wallingford end was never finished, there being several buildings and quite a bit of scenery still to be completed. In a fit of, perhaps misguided, enthusiasm, I decided to rectify this situation and I chose to start by constructing the signal box. I hadn’t been able to find any plans for the signal box but there are several useful photos in the books already mentioned. The caption of one of these states that the signal box contained a 13-lever frame and that “The building was constructed of timber on a low brick base with official dimensions of 16ft 1in long by 11ft wide (usually inside locking room.)”

Based on these dimensions, and those assessed from counting the bricks in the photographs, I produced a set of scale elevation drawings using AutoCad LT software. These were pasted onto cereal packet cardboard and a mock-up was constructed to test the mass of the building in the available space. It also provided an opportunity to check whether it looked right from different angles, when viewed against the photographs in the books. Test fitting it on the layout showed that it fitted and that it was a good facsimile of the original.

Wallingford Station with lots more to do. The signal box sits at the end of the platform

A mock-up of the box drawn in AutoCAD and constructed in card.

Being satisfied with the mock-up, the next step was to construct the building itself for which I delved into my stock of styrene sheet. I constructed the building as a series of modules to minimise the damage caused by excess handling and to make painting easier. The modules constructed were the base, the main upper building, the roof and the steps.
To reduce the possibility of the building distorting over time, I constructed the model using two layers of styrene sheet, the inner layer being plain and the outer layer being embossed. I used Flemish bond brickwork for the base and planking for the cabin. In addition, the frame of both the lower and upper cabins were both well braced for rigidity.

The window of the lower cabin was constructed from styrene microstrip. However, I realised at an early stage that I would not be able to make a decent job of the main cabin’s windows due to their size and number, so I contacted PECO and was able to buy frets of the windows that they use in their own signal box kits. The windows are slightly larger than I needed but by careful adjustment of the signal box design, the difference was engineered out. The door to the cabin was scratch-built from sheet and strip.
Guttering and downpipes were made from brass tubing, guttering being filed down to a half round shape as I could not find any commercially available in the size that I wanted. I opted for brass in preference to styrene so that the finished components would be more robust when handled.
The roof was made from styrene tile-embossed sheet, with strip bargeboards fitted at each end for structural strength, so that the roof can be removed when required. The finials at each end of the roof were made from plastic rod which was drilled and reinforced with brass rod. These were then carefully turned down in a lathe using a series of small files to achieve the classic GWR style. The brass core was essential for structural rigidity in forming the delicate shape.

During construction. The brass gutter and downpipe are visible

The steps to the cabin were drawn on graph paper (my preferred method of drafting) and the components were cut from styrene strip. The construction of the steps was fiddly as getting the three-dimensional alignment right with such a delicate structure required extreme patience, something that doesn’t come naturally to me. Painting was carried out while the building was still in its sub-assembly form. In this way, I was able to paint the items over the space of a few days. The base was sprayed using red primer and the cabin and roof with grey primer. The base was airbrushed with brick colour (Humbrol 70) prior to dry brushing various colours and using Humbrol washes. The cabin was hand painted in matt cream (Humbrol 103) with the windows finished satin white (Humbrol 134). The paintwork was toned down with a light application of Humbrol brown wash and some gentle dry brushing of dark grey. The tiles on the roof were painted with a variety of grey paints to represent the differing shades that occur on tiled roofs and the whole roof was given a thin coat of satin varnish to even out the effect of the different paints that were used.

The signal box interior with the scratchbuilt lever frame

The position of the signal box on the layout means that the front of the building cannot be seen by the public, who view only the back and sides. I debated whether to produce a nameboard for the front of the building and eventually decided that I should do so for completeness. This probably says rather too much about my character. The length of the wording WALLINGFORD STATION BOX looked right with 3mm high letters, so a set of these was purchased from Slaters. This was the first time that I had used styrene letters and I hadn’t appreciated quite how delicate and fragile they are. My sanity was sorely taxed throughout the whole exercise, but the end result was, I feel, well worth it.

The finished signal box in position at the end of the platform. The lever frame has yet to be placed inside

The actual Wallingford station box (Photo: C F D Whetmath; from The Wallingford Branch by Paul Karau and Chris Turner and published by Wild Swan Publications)